And here we are, back again for another edition of pro wrestling’s most eclectic column, the one and only “Tossing Salt – Worldwide News”.  We’re less than a week away from Wrestlemania XXX and everyone and everything is fired up and excited. I know I am. So let’s just skip the chit chat and get busy.  I’m Doug (and you’re not!)  Let’s do this.  Let’s start off with some…

 

 

I wonder if it’s true?  The real reason CM Punk left the WWE is that they still haven’t brought back those ice cream bars.

 

Based on the past couple of weeks, the rest of the Wyatt Family, Luke Harper and Eric Rowan, are damn good wrestlers in their own right.

 

The Wyatts need a female member of the family.

 

A great video on Monday night highlighting the many victories of Triple H.  I’m tired of HHH, but damn if he’s not doing a great job with Bryan building their match.  

 

So if the Bryan / HHH match at Wrestlemania XXX goes to a no-contest, will both men be eliminated from the main event title match or will both men go on to the title match?  It would be great bragging rights for Bryan to be able to say “I beat Evolution to win this title”.  Then Ric Flair would come out and say, “you haven’t beaten me yet!”.  Bryan versus Flair for the WWE Championship on RAW?  It could happen.

 

I still hope we get an edition of Piper’s Pit at Wrestlemania. Piper interviews Hogan. It has to happen.

 

With the card that’s been announced thus far, I don’t know how the WWE is going to fill four hours of pay=per-view time at the big show.  Look for lots of filler.

 

No Chris Jericho at the big show?  I wonder why?  Or are we being swerved?  Hmmmmm.

 

It seems now that Lanny Poffo is fine with Randy Savage being inducted as a solo act into the WWE Hall of Fame.  Good because Savage (and Miss Elizabeth) both deserve to be there.

 

I saw a really good interview with David Benoit on YouTube earlier today.  Is there another “Rabid Wolverine” in our future?

 

Stone Cold Steve Austin?  He’s going to be at the Hall of Fame Ceremony.  Will he be a part of Wrestlemania XXX in some capacity?  Can you give me a hell yeah!

 

And now…

 

 

“While all the wrestlers in the back are laughing and joking, the King and the Idol are up front cooking and smoking, and this ain’t no gaga and this ain’t no jive, it’s a known fact Jack that the two thirds of the world is covered with water, the other third is covered by the King and the Idol” – Austin Idol

 

“Wrestling II, he is nothing but a little short legged freak, a pencil neck geek, with a little pea head and a lousy physique.” – Austin Idol

 

“You gonna watch him beg, you gonna watch him plead , scream, cry, beg for mercy and I’ll tell you something, I’ll give him no mercy, the only mercy he’s gonna get is gonna be from his mother when they have to put his face back together!” – Bobby Duncum

 

“This is for all those fat, two bit nickel, gutter tramps out there that call themselves women and put their make up on with colorin’ crayons, I got a real old lady in Jacksonville, Florida, I don’t need nobody else, that’s right I said it!” – Buddy Landel

 

Time for a quick recap from Monday night…

 

 

We start off with The Undertaker.  He’s talking.  We get Brock and Heyman.  They’re walking.  A brawl and Taker learns his alphabet and numbers as he eats an F-5.  Alberto Del Rio kicks Big E for a non-title win over the IC Champion.  We vote on The Shield and listen to Bray Wyatt sing. That boy has a big future.  Summer Rae takes a win from Natayla.  Stephanie and HHH are here.  They mock the crowd, declare the end of the “Yes!” movement and HHH vows victory at Wrestlemania XXX.  A great video about the virtues of HHH.  Batista and Orton come out.  Randy sucks up.  Batista just sucks!  They’re fighting later and it’s no disqualification.  Later tonight, we get a Piper’s Pit.  Los Matadores & The Usos defeated The Real Americans & Rybaxel.  Fandango and Damien Sandow bow down to Cody and Dustin Rhodes in another great tag match.  Bray Wyatt introduces Sister Abigail to R-Truth and Little Jimmy.  Xaiver Woods gets a taste of The Family too and gets tossed to the floor.  Naomi takes on AJ Lee in a Lumberjill Match.  Naomi wins and AJ can feel that title slipping away.  Kane and Roman Reigns have a match.  It isn’t long before the New Age Outlaws and the rest of The Shield get involved and we get some OINGO BOINGO action.  Roddy Piper is here and he’s talking about the Andre the Giant Battle Royal.  We get Miz.  We get Dolph.  We get Sheamus.  We even get Titus, who barks at Piper.  Piper starts a brawl and everyone comes out for a Battle Royal Preview.  Big Show is the last man standing.  It’s time for Orton versus Batista.  Stephanie and HHH are at the announce table.  A good fight ends in no contest as Daniel Bryan shows up and beats the holy hell out of HHH, who’s forced to flee up the ramp as the “Yes!” chants fill the arena.  Bryan whooped that ass!  And that’s how you recap RAW.

 

I have answers so it must be…

 

 

 

I’m not sure if you’re talking about wrestling in general or my personal “Top 5” moments so I’;; do both.  As far as the business in general, I think it would start with the infamous “Black Saturday” where Vince and the WWF bought out Georgia Championship Wrestling and their TBS time-slot, followed by Ted Turner buying out Crockett and establishing WCW.  Next would be “The Monday Night Wars” with Nitro and RAW going head to head every week.  Fourth would be when the WWE bought out and won the “wars” against WCW and ECW, thus becoming the only dog in the fight.  And lastly, the creation and launch of the WWE Network since it has totally changed the landscape of pro wrestling and how business will be done forever.

 

As for my personal “Top 5” moments, I’ll go with Flair, The Andersons and Tully form the Four Horsemen,  Hogan joins Hall & Nash to form the nWo, The Monday Night Wars with RAW and Nitro going head to head every week / the Attitude Era, WCW closes down and is bought out by the WWE and Vince “wins the war” and finally “The WWE Network”.

 

 

It’s probably the only kind of match that Vince and Hogan could pull off at this point in their careers since neither can take bumps or have any kind of real “wrestling” match. But we’ve been there and done that with Hogan and Vince, if I remember correctly.  Or maybe that was Flair?  I don’t know – senility is a terrible thing.  But if Vince and Hulk were to ever have any kind of issues and face-off these days, I would definitely prefer that they use other wrestlers to represent them in any kind of match and remain outside the ring and away from any kind of real physical action.

 

 

Since I’m from and live in NC, I’m almost required to say “Ric Flair”.  He was the first Mid-Atlantic based guy to be the NWA Champion and he did a fantastic job representing both the NWA and Crockett Promotions while champion.  But that being said, my favorite of these three and the one that I truly enjoyed the most was Mr. Harley Race.  There are champions and then there’s Harley, truly in a league of his own.

 

 

I really don’t think Ricky would have made a great singles champion.  He’s a good wrestler and talented enough, but for me, I think he would get kind of stale and old rather quickly.  Morton was at his best as playing the “babyface in peril” and then making the hot tag off to Robert Gibson, or whoever his partner was.  He had a good singles run against Ric Flair, but that was against Flair, who at that point and time, made Nick Gulas and Rufus R. Jones look like World Champion material.  I don’t think that Morton has that special “It” quality to have good matches against anyone and change up in the ring as needed, two qualities that a singles champion needs.  He’s a talented wrestler, but it takes more than just talent and in my opinion, Morton was lacking.

 

 

I’ve always been a huge fan of the Midnight Express and of the Four Horsemen and my first thought was that this would be great, but then I thought about it some more and realized that it probably wouldn’t have worked.  Lane and Eaton are both fantastic wrestlers, but I can’t imagine them without Jim Cornette at their side. And when you factor that in, it takes away from the magic and mystique of this idea.  It makes sense in a fashion since Lane was originally trained by Ric Flair and since Arn and Eaton were, in real life, best friends, but it just seems wrong and missing something and would have, in my opinion, hurt the Midnighters as much as it helped.  It’s a great “what if” to speculate on, but to me, I think that things worked out for the best as they actually happened.  

 

And on to…

 

 

“You talk about somebody being goofy, this guy is stuck for an answer when you tell him hello.” – Fred Blassie

 

David Crockett: “You are as low as a snake!”

Roddy Piper: “Is that right? And I’m taller than you are.  Isn’t that humorous…”

 

“Who dat say who dat when I say who dat?” – Buckwheat

 

And now, some…

 

 

The more I think about it, the more I like the Battle Royal in tribute to Andre The Giant.  I just don’t want the Big Show to win.  Too obvious. We need a good swerve.  I’m looking at Cesaro.

 

Dark Journey versus Tammy Sytch versus Missy Hyatt in a “Loser Gets The Locker Room” triple-threat match?  Wouldn’t that be fun to watch and see which one can throw the match first? “American Male Gigalo” Buff Bagwell could be the special guest referee.

 

Isn’t Jeff Jarrett’s new promotion supposed to be starting up in the next couple of weeks?  I’m ready for it.

 

Someone tried to plant an internet rumor yesterday that Jeff Jarrett and Toby Keith’s partner in the new promotion was going to be Shane McMahon.  That’s just damn crazy.  We all know that Jarrett and Keith’s new partners are going to be Eric Bischoff and Verne Gagne.

 

What’s happened to Brad Maddox?  He’s supposed to be the GM of RAW, but we never see him on RAW?  Go figure.

 

Last chance for a Disco Inferno versus Fandango “Dance-Off” at Wrestlemania XXX. Come on Vince. Don’t make me beg.  Please!!!!

 

And finally…

 

 

Last week, I asked this question.  I began wrestling in the 1960′s in my native Canada and gained early success as a masked man who was determined to “keep wrestling scientific”, but that ended when I was unmasked by the legendary Sheik.  Eventually, I moved to the Carolinas where I was briefly managed by the original Nature Boy Buddy Rogers and had success as both a singles and tag team wrestler, winning all of the regional titles at some point and also carrying the Canadian Championship as well.  I also had some success in the Central States region, but then I moved to the Mid-South region and totally changed my gimmick and character and never looked back.  I went from the well-respected and extremely scientific grappler to a wild and demented man with a partially shaved head, face paint and a crazy, far-away look in my eyes as I destroyed my opponents.  I had a high-profile run in the WWF, but best moments were probably in the Mid-South region and World Class territories.  I’ve been managed by such names as Bobby Heenan, Jimmy Hart, Sunshine, Dark Journey and Percy Pringle. My picture was featured in Sports Illustrated in a 1985 article about professional wrestling.  I retired in the late 1990′s, but came back to wrestling in 2004.  My last match was in 2007.  I wrote a book in 2006.  Who Am I?

 

And the answer was, of course, none other than Dewey Robertson, aka The Missing Link.  Dewey first tasted success as the “Masked Crusader”.  In the Mid-Atlantic region, Dewey was managed by Buddy Rogers and held both the Mid-Atlantic Championship and Mid-Atlantic Tag Team Championship.  In the Mid-South, Dewey shaved his head and used green face paint to transform himself into The Missing Link.  And the rest was, as you say, history.

 

Correctly answering were:  Shane Briggs, Bob Magee, Chad Burttram, Russell Jackson, Mr. Ryan Springer, Harold Schwan, Jeremy Vinduska and Joe Hugelman.  Great job and well done to these distinguished gentlemen.  And now, let’s do another, shall we?

 

I began wrestling in my home country of Great Britain in 1967, first under my real name and then using the name of a famous American wrestler with who I shared a similar stature and build.  But that name was soon modified and I began to establish an identity of my own.  I was a tag team partner with one of Britain’s biggest (and I mean that literally) stars, but when we broke up and he turned face, we had a feud that lasted for years until his retirement in 1993.  Though I mainly remained in England, I also worked for a while for Stu Hart’s Stampede Wrestling and in Germany and Australia as well.  My one main claim to fame in the United States was when I came to Atlanta and joined Kevin Sullivan’s faction for a short time, aiding him in his efforts to end Hulkamania.  I wrestled then not under my more established identity, but instead was named after a mysterious, some say mythical, legend.  My time in the U.S. was cut short when I was diagnosed with cancer and returned home to the U.K.  I have appeared in a couple of movies, including “Chariots of Fire” and “Give My Regards To Broad Street”.  Who Am I?

 

Do you think you know the answer?  Send your guess to my e-mail at Doug28352@yahoo.com or else through my inbox at Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/saltpalace.  And with that, I think I’m going to call it a day and put this baby to bed.  Thanks for reading.  As the great Baron Von Raschke would say, “Dat is all de’ people need to know!” I’m Doug and I will see you on Thursday with my edition of “Wrestling Fact Or Fiction!”.  Have a great one and take it sleazy!

 

Ubuntu!